vote

nick clegg (doesn't he just look so happy being next to david cameron, they do make such a lovely couple) has delivered on the promise to propose to have a potential referendum about changing the first past the post voting system.
assuming that the members of parliament agree to it, the referendum will allow the public to decide if the tried and trusted first past the post system stays or if it gets replaced by the new shiny alternate vote system (voters rank the candidates in order of preference and if someone gets over 50% of first votes then they get elected, if there is no clear winner then the candidate is eliminated and second choices on their ballots get allocated across the remaining candidates and so it goes until someone emerges with over 50% of the vote. simple really).
as part of the ‘revolution in voting’ that is so close to the heart of nick clegg and the liberal democrats are the plans to change constituency sizes – to make them all about the same size and to reduce the number of members of parliament.
not that it matters what i think but reducing the number of mps seems to be a drastic move, especially as the justification of it seems to be make politics cheaper. really what we want isn’t cheaper politics we want politicians who don’t take the piss with their expenses. additionally, if we really thought about it, we would rather have more mps so that we have more chance to get to see our political representatives. more mps also mean more diversity in the houses of commons; well that is my theory anyway.
however this isn’t about that.
this is about voting.
the liberal democrats are keen on this the new av system because they feel it will make it so much fairer on the smaller parties (code for “make is so much fairer on the liberal democratic party”) to win seats in the houses of parliament.
not wanting to burst the liberal democrat’s bubble but their chances of ever getting elected to power disappeared up the swanee since they became part of the cod/dem coalition – so their chances have gone from no chance to no fucking way.
leaving that aside the members of parliament will be asked to vote on whether or not the av referendum goes ahead. they will vote yes or no.
and if it comes to the electorate we will have the choice between adopting the alternative vote system or staying with the current first past the post system (or majority vote).
mmm so let’s consider that for a moment. the first past the post system is not good enough for nick clegg and the liberal democrats but it is good enough a method to vote on whether or not we have an alternative system.
all very confusing.

anxiety

anxiety
the bbc have a story about a new report from scientists which say people who are suffering from heart conditions are more likely to die if they also suffer from anxiety disorders.
it is the sort of research that makes me go: no shit sherlock!
but it is good news for the national health service. no matter what the con/dems say the nhs is not safe with them. i know it. you know it. they know it, everyone knows it. even if they make sure that the nhs is protected from their swinging cuts they are still going to wage war on the administrators who help run the place. in the world of cameron, osborne and grove hospital administration would be outsourced to anyone who promises to do it cheaply. the con/dems are the neo-jewish tailors of modern economics: never mind the quality feel the width is their motto.
so why is the report about anxiety being linked to deaths in heart condition sufferers good for the nhs? simple: can’t be many of us who are not feeling anxious these days. the nhs will save a fortune in the people who die before they get to the point of treatment.
still look on the bright side it does mean that there will be a lot more vacancies going in undertaking profession.

40%

the con/dem chancellor is asking government departments to prepare plans for a 40% cut in their spends.
it is a scary number. no matter how you slice and dice it cuts on that sort of scale means lots of lost jobs, it means lots of services cut or lost. a few hard core tories will talk about how the private sector will step in to save the day by providing lots of jobs and filling the services void. of course the tories will also say "and the private sector will do it so much better" and yes we all know how well they have done with the trains, so much better now than it was under british rail (oh and we still have to give them tax payers money). we all remember those promises of competition meaning prices will be kept low on our energy costs.

more than likely the 40% is a number has been floated so that when the cuts come in at 25% or 30% we will all cheer and praise osborne for his hard work, his hard decisions, while secretly being thankful that it wasn't as bad as we thought.

while all the cuts are being made to public services we will be told it is necessary, we can't spend more than we bring in, we can't keep servicing such a debt. it is labour's fault that they didn't mend the roof while the sun shone, blah blah blah.
of course there will be little blame laid at the feet of the financial institutions who caused the problem in the first place, the financial institutions that the previous government bailed out (which is why they had to borrow lots of money in order to prop up the wrecked free market economy. oddly they did it very well, strange that bit gets forgotten).

one thing that does seem to have been acknowledged by the con/dems is that this was (and is) a global problem. during the election it was all new labour's fault. now it is a global situation. funny that.

even funnier is that the reason we have to go through the austerity measures is because we want to keep our triple-a rating. a rating given by the same fucking financial institutions who fucked up the situation in the first place. fucking irony for you.

even funnier is that the people who can least afford to pay for the bail out are the ones who are going to bare the brunt of it. hell yeah put vat up, the average income families can't avoid paying it and it takes a chunk out of their wages.
what increase the top rate of tax? can't do that we need those wealth creators. so far they aren't doing too much for us, other than lining their own pockets.

more and more it seems that the cuts are not about the economy, but about ideology.
the tories are living the thatcher dream. they won't be building new prisons in the future but workhouses.

i tell you something - it has to suck to be a liberal democrat.

pigs

pigs have flown.
hell has frozen over.
digby jones was on the radio today and i found myself almost agreeing with him. not swearing at him, not curising him, not screaming 'shut up you fat fuck'. i was almost agreeing with him.
i think i might be mellowing.
note this day in your diary.

protest

i am not the world’s greatest protester.
nor am i the world’s greatest demonstrator.
(it may be that i am in contention for being the world’s not world’s greatest, not a title i covet.)

however there are times when all men need to stand up and be counted sunday june 20th was one of those days.

recently the, less than pleasant group, english defence league (edl) had made an appearance on the streets of whitechapel. it wasn’t successful; they were confronted by locals and carted off by the police.
on the sunday in question they were going to stage a rally in tower hamlets.
various groups put the call out for there to be a demonstration, a show of community. posters were dotted all over the area: meet at stepney green station, 12.30pm and march to altab ali park for some speeches. the umbrella organisation for the march was unite against fascism (uaf).

for those who don’t know much about the english defence league here is the science part. the english defence league see themselves as a single issue party – they are against the spread of islamism and islamic extremists. the edl claim to be multi-ethnic and multi-faith, they even have a jewish division – just how progressive are they? they say they do not have a problem with muslims in general, just extremists.
the rest of us think they are a group of racist neo-fascists.
i’ll come to the reason why they were preparing to march in tower hamlets later. although there was a specific reason for their planned march there are other reasons why tower hamlets is an ideal target for them, the borough is home to europe’s largest mosque, it is also home to england’s largest muslim population (east london advertiser breaks down the borough’s population as 35% bangladeshi with 10% somali), it is also a borough that suffers from great social deprivation with high rates of unemployment, crime and drug dependency among the youth. in short the borough has its problems, in the main people get along and get on with their lives.
end of the science bit.


some of you who know me might actually claim there is something that i am great at: not being on time. that sunday was no different. i left my place just after 12.30pm. all it meant was that i had missed the start of it all, no matter i would be able to catch them before they made it to the park, where i could join in. fifteen minutes later i am at an empty park. a look along the whitechapel and all i can see is traffic. at the park entrance are the boys and girls of the socialist workers party (swp). as ubiquitous as they are the ever present petition is more so.
a quick chat with the swp and it turns out that there might have been several posted start times for the rally. obviously when marx was labouring over das kaptial he didn’t feel the need to add a chapter about punctuality (he left that to adam smith).
as it was a nice day i sat in the park and waited.
and waited.
and waited.
when the revolution comes it won’t be televised because it will happen in the ad breaks, the irony is that for all the theory about a vanguard party what they really need is a frederick taylor in charge of them – it might not be lenin was thinking of, but it would be on time.

and that is where the humour stops (what do you mean? did it ever start).

with a growing rumble of cheers and shouts the parade of protest arrived at the park. organisers put the numbers at around five thousand; i think they are being very generous
once everyone is in the park the speeches begin. they are short, almost perfunctory. little more than ‘edl out’, ‘bnp out’, ‘community unite’. to be honest on a normal day they probably don’t need to be more that. turns out that this wasn’t a normal day.

now remember that this was all about community, standing shoulder to shoulder. as someone who doesn’t do this sort of thing on a regular basis i was struck by a couple of things when i was looking around the park. once you took out the organisers, press, police and members of the swp (and other such organisations) the number of non-asians there could be counted on your fingers and toes (and i am being generous here). that there seemed to be an awful lot of placards that had been stripped down to no more than large wooden sticks – their original message replaced by a new, and unmistakable, one that had little to do with community. that there were a fair few youths who were walking around with their faces covered, and not because of some belief in female modesty, rather a case of keeping their identity secret.

one of the reasons for the speeches being short and sweet was because the reason for the protest had disappeared as during the week the edl had called off their march. the parting shot from the speakers was to ask everyone to leave the park peacefully and to go home and enjoy the nice weather.
you would have thought that was a victory.
evidently not.
a few members of the swp walked by and they were getting excited about a possible edl march in barking the following weekend. close your eyes stretch your imagination just a little and a new t-shirt range comes into view: philosophy hooliganism.
while a bunch of asian youth strut by each telling the other that they are not going home, they are going out to look for the edl.
an atmosphere of whipped up anger and potential violence permeates the park.
for all of that nothing happens in the park. people linger. some wave banners. some chat. some take photos. others look to get petitions signed.
i left the park and went about the rest of my day.
much later i am on my way home and the police are still out in force. they are preventing people walking down the whitechapel high street in the area of the east london mosque. throughout the area around the mosque there is a heavy police presence.
the next day i learn from a local shopkeeper that a group of youths kicked off with the police. he was less than sympathetic towards the youth.

interestingly the reason the edl had planned to be to in the area was because they were going to protest a conference, at a local venue, featuring ‘controversial’ islamic speakers scheduled to take place on the same sunday. although the uk islamic conference gets mentioned a few times in the local press, details are always vague, except, once, to say that none of the speakers were on the government’s proscribed list. pretty much the conference was ignored in the protest literature that could be found.
according to the people at indymedia (a grouping of social and political activists) the uk islamic conference would have featured speakers who condoned killing homosexuals and anti-semitism, among other things. (in a little dose of irony the venue in question had only just signed up to tower hamlets’ “no place for hate” campaign, needless to say they agreed to cancel the conference).

the cancellation of the uk islaminc conference lead to the edl cancelling their march and claiming victory on their website. the call then went out for the unite against fascism rally to be called off. however it went on because (to quote the east london advertisers) community leaders were concerned about tensions still running high and that a peaceful rally would give people a chance to express their feelings.
ah if only that had been the case.

as with all these things it is difficult to grasp the full picture, yet reading some of the accounts of the events i can’t help but think that there is a wilful decision to ignore aspects of the whole thing in favour of just the bits that promote your point of view.
strangely i believe that sort of blinkered vision of the world means you are never going to be able to overcome divisions.
unite against fascism are there to campaign against racism and fascism. their goals are noble, no one wants hate on the streets, no one wants to see people discriminated against or attacked because of the colour of their skin (or the faith they choose). yet the uaf said nothing about the uk islamic conference. now i admit i only have the word of indymedia about how extreme the speakers may have been, yet i doubt that tower hamlets would have pushed so hard for its cancellation if there were not some truth to it. so from the point of view of the uaf hate can only come from one direction and if we are blunt here; that hate has only one colour: white.
the uaf, respect, whitechapel anarchist group and others praised how demonstration brought the local community together, yet the evidence in altab ali park pointed to the fact that this was predominantly an asian gathering. the other parts of the community seemingly unaware of the protest or not caring about it both are a little worrying.
when it comes to violence everyone is quick to condemn the edl for bring their thugs on to our streets, yet the sunday in question saw violence for the sake of violence. there was no edl for the local youth to lash out against. the whitechapel anarchist group may see it as being heavy handed policing while ajmal masroor (former liberal democrat candidate) may see it as a symptom of disaffected youth being angry at the world. either way it was still violence (a van driver and a skinhead were attacked, photographers threatened).
yet their violence is not subjected to the same outrage that would have greeted violence perpetuated by the edl. instead excuses and reasons are found. disturbingly groups such as respect and socialist workers party seem silent on the violence.

perhaps this is where the problem lies, or begins. groups like the english defence league or the british national party are not really much of a threat in the great scheme of things. give them the oxygen of publicity and they soon show themselves to be the idiots that they really are. prevent them from having a say and you create victims and lead others to wonder what it is they have to say and they stand for.
yet if you try to prevent them from having their say while staying quiet on the anti-democratic and racist language and actions of others then you stop being a fighter for the truth and just become a hypocrite.
none of which is to say they have to have a free ride. their claims and arguments can be debated, challenged and shown to be false. democracy can only work if it works for all groups. frankly if you are scared of the debate then perhaps you are scared that you can’t answer their claims.
hate and fear and lie at the root of many evils, they are not overcome by ignoring the hate spewed by one group while concentrating on the same sort of hate that comes from another group. if communities are to truly stand together then hatemongers no matter what their colour or faith have to be confronted and challenged.
for diversity to work it has to be colour blind and the champions of diversity have to be able to stand up to hate, oppression, racism and fascism no matter what colour it comes in.
it seems that is harder than it sounds.

600000

the 'official' figures of the number of jobs that will be lost in the public sector is 600,000.

the confederation of british industry are now mentioning that for the private sector to absorb those jobs will mean that there will have to be training programmes in order to help workers transfer between the jobs.

i guess that is the cbi pointing out that jobs are not going to appear magically and that if there is going to be any training then they want the government to give them funds.

total tossers.

jobs

it is a funny old world out there in the post employment void.
looking for work is very easy, finding something you want to (or can do) is less so.

the people at the jobcentres are not really there to help; they are just there to tick a few boxes. ask them about something and they just look at you blankly. just recently one of them mentioned to me that my local idea store (the new fancy name for a library, which means that yes you can go to a dance studio, just don't expect to find the book you are looking for) runs a weekly job club. it would have been nice of them to tell me that months ago, but i guess it is a secret.

those of you lucky enough not to have to endure the jobcentre may not know about the jobpoint machines. these allow you to see what new jobs there are. very basic technology, could easily do with a revamp, but let us not go there.
sometimes the jobs are a little surprising. mostly it is because there are job agencies who put their jobs through the job centre. so there are the occasional why on earth are you listing that 100k a year job as vp of an american hedge fund in the local jobcentre, surely there are head-hunters who deal with that.
or the time there was a call out for a nuclear safety inspector. again a fairly specialised job, i am figuring there is a database of the people who can do, even so it is nice to know i could apply for it and just doctor my cv a little bit to cover up the skills i don't have.
maybe i should apply for the job as a jihadist analyst. i reckon there might be a lot of travel involved in that one. though the one that just asks for international military analysis sounds much safer.
even the 2012 olympics have several jobs going in what strike me as key areas – the wrestling and modern pentathlon teams are looking for managers. call me stupid but you would have thought that they would have had them in place by now. guess no one loves wrestling or modern pentathlon. maybe i will give it a couple of weeks and then i will apply. after all how hard can it be?

still i was heartened to hear today that at least one man isn’t keen on giving up his job. seems fabio capello likes the job and seems keen to stay in place. can’t blame him, he only gets £6 million a year, so we know it is a labour of love. given that all the coverage of the world cup indicated that the players were calling the shots, rather than the manager (yes i am thinking about you david james and john terry) the money the manager gets is money for old rope.
so if capello goes i think i will throw my hat in the ring. i will offer to do it for less, i will guarantee we won’t do very well (it is called promise less, deliver more – though i am not sure about the delivery part) and i will be happy to let the players pick themselves.
i see it as a draw draw win lose situation.
even better it is one more off the unemployment statistics – iain duncan smith will love it.

austerity

things are tough. times are hard. we are all in it together, all feeling the pain. share the medicine so that we can all enjoy the good times when they return.
have to love it as a story to sell us on.
it may not have gone over as easily if the world cup was not on to divert attention away from what the con/dems are doing.

ah and it is the world cup that has a little of my ire at this time.
the bbc have done their usual fine job of covering the event. 5live as a station seems to have moved to south africa en masse. mornings begin with a dose of nicky campbell reporting from the streets of south africa. aside from the accents often the vox pops from there sound pretty much like the ones we hear from here.

what is this nicky is saying? who is this nicky is talking about? why it is the mayor of london, boris johnson out for a jog in the streets of cape town. must be nice for bojo to be out there.

back home in london there are strong reports that fares on tubes, buses and trains will be rising pretty steeply. not to worry though boris is out in south africa having a bit of a jog and a big old jolly. golly it must be fun to be the mayor. (which i suppose is why ken livingstone has decided he will run for mayor – anyone want to take odds that if he doesn’t get the labour nomination he will run as an independent?)

of course while people are being told that they are going to have to make do, sacrifice, not expect pay increases bojo can have a trip to south africa. i am sure there is a good reason for it. perhaps it is to do with the olympic games in 2012, though quite what boris is going to learn is beyond me. maybe it is to do with the 2018 world cup bid, again quite what boris has to do with what will be a national event is beyond me.
i am sure that the press and public relations people can dress it up so that it looks like boris is doing something good for london. crikey think of the business he will generate.

meanwhile prices go up on transport. getting across town on the tube is pretty expensive as it stands, and it is looking like it will be getting even more expensive. not to worry though i am sure boris had a great time out at the world cup. i am sure he did a lot of business and londoners will be seeing the benefit of all his hard work.

or to quote jimmy hill: “chin chin”.
cripes.

5live

i spend most of my time listening to the radio.
station of choice is the bbc's 5live. right now it is the stephen nolan show.
right now i am trying not to shout at it. right now i am trying not to throw it out the window.
5live is cathartic. while it is on i can vent and spleen.
bless the bbc for such a service.

hay

bloody hay fever.
has me knocked for six.
blurgh!

gutted

400 mps did not get their full pay for may.
i am guessing that there isn't going to be an outpouring of sympathy for them.

dull

going through a really really dull patch.
i have lost my mojo, it has followed my get up and go and has left the building.
time for a change.

quote

private eye is always full of chucklesome moments.
they had a little piece about lord mandelson who apparently contacted rebekah brooks, chief executive of news international, to comment on the fact that the sun newspaper was coming out in favour of the conservative party ahead of the election.
lord mandelson, taking a leaf out of the book of most sensible people, described the staff of the sun as, very aptly, "total cunts".
no arguing with that.
it is also further proof that mandy is still needed in politics.

well it would be except that mandy claims he called them "total chumps".
additionally mandelson has agreed to sell his memoirs to harpercollins (a murdoch owned company) and it is likely that it will be serialised in the times.

oh well so mandy isn't perfect. a flawed genius with a foul mouth, gotta love him.

still

too hot.
booooo to that.

heat

too fucking hot.
just thought i would tell you.

wtf!

susan boyle in the observer.
what the fuck!
why.
an ok singer who became a sensation because she looked like a munter. that pretty much sums up the susan boyle experience.
next week in the observer: jade the reassessment, plus her deficit reduction dvd.

if the observer continues to dumb down like this it won’t be long before there are page three girls in it. they will all be post-doctoral students who count medieval literature and geopolitical think-tanks among their favourite things.

quote

"it was as if he had been put on earth to do the job that was asked of him." (george osborne)
"which i feel all my life has prepared me for." (david laws)

crikey talk about setting the bar high, we are not talking about a job here, nor are we talking about a vocation, we are talking destiny.
ah if only reality lived up to the hype.

david laws was the treasury chief secretary, a very important job in the con/dem coalition government. he has had to resign because of, what looks to be, financial jiggery-pokery. before the revelations in the daily telegraph david laws was a rising star in the political galaxy. he had been a very successful investment banker who decided he wanted to enter politics to make a difference (isn’t that what they all say). once in politics he quickly became part of the new breed of liberal democrats all for free trade, belief in the private sector, less power for the european union and a smaller role for the state in providing welfare provision.
quite why he was a liberal and not a conservative is beyond me. seems it was also beyond the tories as george osborne had offered him a seat on the, then, shadow cabinet. to his credit david laws turned it down. i guess that changed when there was real power on offer.

david laws was also one of the crucial architects of the conservative and liberal democratic coalition.

for all intents and purposes we are talking about a golden boy of politics.
how quickly that can change.

the daily telegraph has revealed that he has claimed £40,000 of taxpayers’ money to pay rent to his partner. for eight years he had been claiming up to £950 a month to rent two rooms in two london properties (which is pretty impressive for an mp that proudly boasts that he spends 4 days a week in his yeovil constituency).
his partner owned the properties.
since 2006 members of parliament have been banned from leasing accommodation from a partner.

the reason this is coming out now is because at the height of the expense scandal david laws hadn’t revealed that his landlord was also his lover.

david laws believes he was had the right to keep his sexuality and his gay relationship private. he is right. it shouldn’t matter what a person’s sexuality is, people are entitled to have a life that is theirs and theirs alone. a person’s sexuality very rarely affects how they do their job.
what does affect them is the opinions, real or perceived, of others. this appears to be the rationale behind david laws’ decision to keep his relationship secret.
a few weeks back a soap star was complaining that his character’s storyline of a man coming to terms with the fact he was gay was getting people calling him a poof or queer. he moaned that in this day and age people should be able to realise that he was just an actor playing a role and that soaps were not real. he may as well have asked to wear a big t-shirt that said “i am not a fag” or “i am not a shirt lifter”.
the shock isn’t that there are people out there who believe that soaps are real, but that there are still people who judge people based on their sexual preferences (oh ok yes there is something wrong with people who like sheep).
so it is easy to see why david laws would have wanted to keep his relationship a secret from the public (as well as, it seems, his friends and family).

what is harder to understand is how that translates into a situation where he believes it justifies him misusing parliamentary expenses.
of course the irony of this is that nick clegg was pretty sanctimonious about the liberal democrats when it came to the expense scandal. so that is a bit of an ooops moment. additionally one of david laws’ main tasks as treasury chief secretary was to oversee the various cost cutting plans to aid the reduction of the government deficit, which also included tough new rules on pay and perks of public sector employees. ooops again.

it is believed that mr. laws is independently wealthy, if that is true then that just compounds the issue. his partner is a political lobbyist and probably isn’t short of a bob or two.

to his credit david laws has been quick to take action and has resigned his post, taking responsibility for his actions. though call me an old cynic (perhaps less of the old) the speed at which he has offered to pay back the money tends to indicate that even he knows he has broken the rules.
given his hawkish views on the deficit i can’t say he will be missed.

(and aren’t you all proud of me that i didn’t sink to the level of doing a his boyfriend is a political lobbyist i guess that means he has backdoor access, i tell you i could write for the sun.)

flagellants

i hate wiggers (white boys being black). their desire to be something that they are not is beyond me, especially as it is mostly all about style rather than substance.
recently my ire has relocated towards the new leaders of the country.

one of the big non-stories of the recent election was the affect of the members of parliament expenses scandal. the electorate was not as exercised over the scandal in quite the same way that the media thought we should be. nor were we as worked up about it as the politicians were.
expenses and trust became part of the narrative for the political leaders.

so here we are and the con/dems are in power and they are making their move to clean up politics. they want us to trust them. they want us to think that they are just like us.
look there is david cameron walking to work. just like you and me.
see nick clegg: he is on the tube. he is one of us.
they are the ‘new us’.

except that they are not like us. not even a little bit. both are ‘leaders of the country’, true i think i could do the job better than they can, but i am not going to get that chance. they are both very wealthy; they are not short of a bob or two and both unlikely to ever worry about where their next meal is coming from.
they are not like us.
to be honest we don’t want them to be like us.

for all the talk of the ‘new politics’ it is nice to see that they are still happy to cynically use the media to show that dave and nick are just like us. oh there is another way they are not like us – we don’t get followed to work by the press and photographs of the journey plastered all over the place, nor are we followed by security services to protect us.
of course there is another reason for their ordinary journeys into work: cost cutting. oh look at us, they are saying, we know that times are tough and we are saving money (your money) by walking into work.
look lads take off your ozwald boateng hair-shirts we don’t begrudge you a car to get safely to work. in fact we would prefer that you were kept safe, got on with the job and stopped playing silly buggers pretending that you are just ordinary chaps.

it is nice to see that samantha cameron isn’t playing the game; she isn’t saying we have tighten our belts, we have to tough it out. nope she is making sure that kitchen in downing street is refurbished (the cameron’s are paying part of the costs). i guess that would have been a saving too far.

in the end it appears there is some common ground between david cameron and me – we both need a new kitchen. though he can afford one.

open

the new east london overground line opened fully today.
quite exciting - especially for those in south london, now they can feel like they are part of the wider community.
the new shoreditch high street station is pretty amazing, very spacious halls for travellers. it is nice to have shadwell station back.
the trains are new and clean, even though their idea of air conditioning is not quite the same as mine. theirs is a slightly warm waft, mine is a chill that makes your nipples stand proud - not sure the traveling public is ready for that, just yet.

of course there is the missed trick of large spaces in stations that could have been used for concession stands, not that i would be suggesting that transport for london could have been charging corporate concerns in order to cut the fares. nope that would be a stupid idea.
aside from that it is a job well done.
i am looking forward to my next trip on, maybe i will venture further into south london.
steady on old chap - everest first, south london next.

summer

i am already hating it.

odyssey2

the post below is a long form epic poem.
actually it isn't, but if i say that it might excuse the length.

so for those of you who can't be bothered to read the long and rambling tale here is the short version.

my planned journey to the tate britain took a turn for the worse when a combination of factors meant that a few buses were missed. which lead to me getting to the tate later than planned.
the trip back to the tate modern was relatively simple, but the show there was not very good.
to cap the day off i got soaked while walking back to brick lane.

pretty much covers the basics - much less swearing, fewer words and probably just as funny.

odyssey

plan is information; knowledge is power and all that.
now picture the scene it is sunday, and i have a plan. i know what i want to do with the day. it is simple; it involves me going here, there, over there and back to here with a stop in-between. really simple.

most of the time when a plan goes wrong it is down to me being stupid or not carrying it out as planned (which when you consider it is a plan is a bit stupid).

i had planned to go to tate britain to see the final day of the chris ofili exhibition (never a good idea to see the last day of a show). get up early walk along the thames. see what i mean simple. ok falls at the first hurdle: don’t get up early.
adaptation is another aspect of plans. so check out the bus routes. i could do the 115 and walk from trafalgar square. mmm i wonder are there any other routes i could take?
let’s check.
get on the internet. go to transport for london website. look at buses. wow they have a new fancy bus map. put in the bus you want and it shows you the route on the map. sweet.
why it is a google map? don’t we have the ordnance survey or the geographers’ map company (they do the famous a-zs) can’t they provide decent and accurate maps for british companies to use? aren’t they cool enough?
back to the story: i bung in a location to see what buses from there might take me to the tate. there are some likely candidates. now what is nice about the new map is that not only does it show you the route, it gives you a list of the bus stops. belt and braces method. nice. sensible. foolproof.
i don’t know about you but there are times when i am using google maps when they don’t seem to work the way they should do – so a few views of different routes and i am getting maps that have routes on them but no streets – london has disappeared. no need to worry because there is a listing of the stops.
344 looks to be the best option, sure it is further to walk to than the 115, but it is a new route for me and it arrives pretty darned close to the tate. 344 it is.
all i need to do is walk to fenchurch street, as that is where the stop is.

walk, walk, walky walk and there i am at the top of fenchurch street. first bus stop and ‘oh look the 344 doesn’t stop here’. shit shit shitty shit shit. i know go into fenchurch street station and get a bus map from there.
bus map in hand. there is the 344 at liverpool street, and there it is again at southwark bridge road – no fucking clue where it is in-between those two. ask the staff at the station? why bother may as well ask a dada mime artist for help.
ok, ok time to amend and adapt the plan. i’ll get to the end of fenchurch street and see what options i have from there.
walk walk walky walk and i am almost at the end of fenchurch street and what the good fuck is that i see going by: yes it is a 344 – just that it doesn’t go down fenchurch street but it goes by it. nice. helpful.
now i am on gracechurch street and i can see a bus stop, and the 344 stops there. oh now you are just taking the piss look at that sign “bus stop not in use” – oh and look there is a helpful note telling me to use the next bus stop on the route – but where is it, would it have hurt to put a map there? no it wouldn’t have but they didn’t.
don’t panic. obviously it will be near london bridge. quickly make my way there, look behind me see a 344 coming, look ahead see a bus stop, run fat boy run.
get there, just in time to see the 344 turn a corner. noooooooo, it’s going to the monument. pissflaps.
walk around to that. no sign of a bus stop. oh i know where it will be. yup there it is, only it is the 344 stop for liverpool street – wrong direction. oh this is stupid.

this is about the time when anyone sensible would give up, but i am committed, i am determined. i am stupid.
if you can’t go forward, then go back. no idea where the next bus stop is, but i know where the previous one is. so off towards liverpool street i go. and there it is a working bus stop and look there is a 344 approaching it. joy.
“excuse me how do i get to fenchurch street?” no no no no no no why me, why? why? why? do my duty and watch another 344 sail on by. fuckity fuck fuck.
finally a 344 turns up. i jump on. happy.
oh by all that is fucking holy, by the power of greyskull and a big what the fucking hell is going on the bus has stopped at the “not in use stop”. remember what i said about planning and information? well it only works when the information you base your decisions on is right – so far transport for london have sold me two pups: firstly the stop is on gracechurch street and not fenchurch street – quite why they can’t get that right is beyond me and secondly they mark a bus stop as not in use when it really is in use. kafka does the krypton factor.
one of the joys of being on the top deck of a bus is that you get to see london from a different vantage point and sometimes that allows you to see the bigger picture. from my seat on high i can see just what has happened. transport of london have obviously employed a total fuckwit whose idea of fun is a facial from a doberman while he sits on a cactus. when said fuckwit was alerting potential customers to the fact that the stop was going to be out of action “due to works” he wasn’t concentrating on his task and was thinking too much about his illicit relations with a dyson no bag big ball machine and put the sign on the wrong fucking stop. quite how he missed the fact that the works were taking place on the other side of the road is beyond me, how he missed that the opposite stop had been fenced off with those bright red barriers that are the pride and joy of so many construction companies will remain a mystery to all the sages and mages in the world.
but can i take this moment to wish upon said fuckwit a plague on his house, a bad case of knob rot and that all the food he eats from now on tastes as if it had been stewed in the socks of a tramp who has not changed for a week or three.
so on the bus, at last. off to tate britain.
further into south london than i normally go.
oh look the imperial war museum, i really should visit it one day and so easy to get to. isn’t southwark bridge road a long road. there is lambeth palace getting close now. soon be there. crikey there is an odd coupling of establishments; right by chariots (roman sauna for men) is a motorcycle showroom. so much easier for the local chapter of the hell’s angels to get their brown wings.
ofili show seen. very good it was.
now i need to get back to the tate modern. sod the expense i will get the tate to tate boat. nice trip on the thames will cheer me up and get me there in no time at all. look at that the next one goes in a few minutes. perfect timing.
noooooooooooooooooooooooo what the wanking hell is going on the sodding place is locked up. nice padlock, below the timetable that clearly states that the next boat is due shortly. well that is a lot of fucking use, not like it is a popular route, i mean who would want to catch a boat between very popular tourist attractions on a sunday afternoon. i have no idea what i was thinking, silly me it is the perfect time to just be closed and no reason posted. arseholes.
it is back to the 344 for me. that will drop me off at the tate modern, or do i stay on and just get back to liverpool street and call it quits? i decide on the tate modern. mistake. show there is major pants. i leave and hoof it back to brick lane – i need a coffee.
and fuck my old boots it decides to rain and rain and rain again.
i am soaked. i look like a drowned ewok.
the moral of the story? not only am i not a map-reader i am not the man with a plan.

ban

finally the election has been sorted. huzzah!
okay i am not happy with the result, but in the spirit of the new politics (copyright nick ‘harlot’ clegg) here are a few things i would like to see banned.

ban members of parliament dodging questions with the very limp phrase ‘above my pay grade’. if you can’t answer simple questions what on earth are you doing running for office. if you don’t want to be out of step with your party save us all some cash and just stay home and send the party whip a postal vote.

let us hear no more bollocks about ‘national interest, not party interest’. if that were truly the case then all three leaders would have said let us all come together and form a national government until such time as the economic crisis has been solved. none of them said it for the simple fact that we would have believed none of them. guess what i haven’t believed one of them when they have said ‘national interest, not party interest’. in fact all it has made me do is shout out ‘liar liar pants on fire’.

while we are at it can we also ban all talk of ‘unelected prime ministers’. i know everyone wants to be like obama but we don’t elect a president we elect a party. i know, i know seems so simple, so straightforward yet it confuses so many people. oddly william hague mentioned it (again) yesterday. so william did we elect nick clegg to be the deputy prime minister? nope. yet we have him, in case you have forgotten he came third. (can’t help but think he is counting the days until the birth of the new cameron and david taking paternity leave,)
still it does me proud to hear fellow citizens claiming that we were living under a dictatorship, a tyrant and that we have seen mugabe (oh that came courtsey of malcolm 'i don't use hyperbole' rifkind) like politics. of course it is good we let the care in the community people have a say, just a shame some of them are in the conservative party.

and can i make a pre-emptive strike and ask that any member of parliament who says ‘day one’ or even more pointlessly ‘minute one’ to be taken out onto college green and be beaten with a ripe kipper and made to wear a dunce’s cap for a week. trust me chaps (and chapettes) uttering ‘from day one’ will not make you sound hip, it will not make you sound executive like, it will not give you that smidgen of street cred you are so desperate for. the kids won’t respect you for using it and the masters of oxford will laugh at you.

see there you go a blueprint for the new politics. simple.

bedfellows

crikey mcmoses but what a turn up for the books, and it isn’t what i would have done.
this time last week three men each had different views of where they would be right now.
david cameron saw himself as the prime minister at the head of a majority parliament.
nick clegg saw himself as either the head of the second strongest party or at the very worst the kingmaker who could play the important role in deciding who would be prime minister.
gordon brown saw the end of his political life.
then the public spoke. they spoke not with a shout, not with a whisper but with an emphatic mumble.
the result: the much heralded hung parliament. for some it was to be the right result, oh how they rue that view now.
the conservatives got 306 seats (36% of the vote).
labour got 258 seats (29% of the vote).
the liberal democrats won 57 seats (23% of the vote).
while it is a bitter pill to swallow the conservatives won, even if they didn’t win an overall majority.
now if i had been gordon brown this is what i would have done: on the friday morning i would have stood at 10 downing street and announced that the labour party were not going to enter negotiations in order to form a coalition, but were preparing to become the official opposition. why would i have done that? several reasons. on a personal level gordon brown has had a torturous time as prime minister neither getting the rub of the green or the credit he deserves, so a period as leader of the opposition would have allowed him to go on the attack and let him show his authentic voice. for labour a period in opposition would be a chance to regroup, recharge and re-asses.
and yes in my fantasy politics gordon brown would have been in charge of labour.
if i had been david cameron i would have probably have listened to the liberal democrats and if the demands were too much i would have said i would be happy to go it alone as a minority government.
poor old nick clegg he has got what he wants and he has found out that it is a poisoned chalice. now he is running between the two parties in order to get the best deal he can possibly can.
while it is true there is a better fit between labour and the liberal democrats, an agreement between the two parties would still not be enough to run the country. in order to do that they would need the support of other parties, such as the scottish national party. for those that support this idea it is seen as a progressive coalition, others have called it a rainbow coalition or a traffic light coalition. more accurately, and more harshly, it has been seen as a coalition of the defeated or losers.
as a down payment for working with labour it seems the liberals have demanded gordon brown’s head, although the price is too high it has been paid. what makes it even harder to swallow is that the eventual prize, a barely sustainable coalition, will lead to labour being unelectable for years to come.
so i am with john reid and david blunkett, labour shouldn’t enter into a coalition, they should man up and be the official opposition. let cameron and clegg be pals and provide an effective opposition to them, sit back and watch them fail.
nick clegg started out looking like a fresh broom in politics, now he is looking like a shabby harlot. now who would have thought that when they were casting their votes.

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nick cohen saying that the liberals didn't do well because the working class have a folk memory of hating the tories.
ian hislop saying that none of them have a moral authority to rule.

now andrew neil now talking to some people from the apprentice - who the fuck cares what they think? oh and one of them spouts some bollocks about the public sector, obviously she is well aware of how the process works. i really hate those sodding celebs who are celebs just because they have appeared on a wanky tv show.

paxman is interview alex salmond. i am quite enjoying him, normally i can't stand him.

labour 133, tories 173, lib dems 26, others 25

although it is not clear the tories have won in that they have beaten labour. they haven't had a knockout blow.
to be fair no one is really crowing about how they have won. it is all very subdued. at the moment there is still the chance that there could be a deal between the labour and lib dem leadership.

crikey labour have gained their second seat.
esther rantzen got tanked. labour hold luton. take that ms celebrity.

oh look cameron has his jacket off.

labour 145, tories 185, lib dems 28, others 25

it will be a hung parliament. it is now down to cameron to decide does he go for a minority rule or does he do a deal with nick clegg and co.

paxman has dropped the bombshell on jack straw that there is talk about a leadership campaign against gordon brown. jack looked like he was going to shit himself, not that is an admission.

jaqui smith has lost her seat - suffering from the expenses scandal.

labour 149, tories 192, lib dems 28, others 25.

oh well time for me to call it quits.
the tory dawn is here.

not a happy day.

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my seat is now not going to declare until 7am. the delay is down to a large turnout (rumoured to be a lot of false proxy votes) and because there is a referendum for a mayor of tower hamlets (hoping the answer to that is no).

darn eric pickles has been re-elected.

labour 113, conservatives 131, lib dems 22, others 24.

labour hold rochdale. seems that duffygate hasn't made a difference there, but it was another nail in the brown coffin.

they keep talking of a variety of swings. so it does seem that the tories will win, but not convincingly. so peter kellner says it is the electorate is saying we don't like labour, but we don't actually like the tories very much either.

dimbleby really lays into a bloke about how shameful the electoral process seems to have been.

labour 116, tories 141, lib dems 23, others 24.
304 seats declared out of 650.

barking - it seems that the bnp are in third place, and so have not challenged labour for the seat. still not declared.

paxman is chatting to david davis - and he thinks that there will be an absolute tory majority. he says that first past post means that labour and lib dems shouldn't be allowed to have a compromise government. though i am not sure how does a minority conservative government work? oh because he expects the other parties to act responsibly, which is short-hand for agreeing with the tories.

labour 121, tories 150, lib dems 23, others 25
so as it stands even with labour and lib dems coming together they don't have more than the tories.

oh well we all knew the tories were going to win.

results13

tories now getting a head of steam up. 25th gan. 108 seats. labour have 102.
even though liberals are doing very badly it does look like they are going to have an important role to play in terms of who lead the country.

oh they have gone back to andrew neil. crikey they have really filled the boat with lots of pointless celebrities. bill wyman has just said that labour never did anything for him. cunt.

andrew rawnsley says there is a pattern growing. there is a swing to the tories. so he says it will be a tory minority government.
charles moore says all the swing is for the tories. but is it enough?
hutton says that brown may do a deal, but it would be a coalition of the defeated. hutton is now saying that the last 45 minutes of the third debate is why the liberals are not doing very well, that was when he defended the amnesty. does seem that everything is being hinged on those debates.

(bugger michael gove is re-elected.)

poor old clegg, what is he going to do.

labour 107, conservatives 120, lib dems 19 and other 24

no breaking the mould.
will we be looking at another election in a few months time?

tories gain carlise. that isn't good. i think the night is about to get worse.

110, 126, 20, 24
that is 28 gains to the tories.

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beginning to flag.

labour 88, conservative 87, liberals 13, others 23

paxman with liam fox and david milliband. fox is saying that the public have voted for change, but not very much enthusiasm.
david milliband saying that no overall majority, then it is ok for parties to seek coalition. (he also looks like a less buff version of cody rhodes).

a liberal lord is saying we should wait to see what the results are.

paxman has asked liam fox is if the horse trading is something good. he says difficult to know where we are. paxman just wants to know can the tories do a deal with the lib dems, but he won't trade principles. so even now the tories can't give a straight answer. milliband seems to be happy to do a chat with the liberals.

97, 94, 14, 23
tories have gained 20 seats.

nick robinson is wondering can cameron get his party to agree to dealing with the liberals in order to get into power. at best he thinks that they will ask the liberals not to try to bring them done.

tories in front. wankers

102, 99, 13, 23

given the results at the moment i think the liberals will be happy to grab their ankles in order to get into power.
i did think that clegg had gone power mad and would do whatever he could to make sure he got to put his feet under the big table. at the moment it looks like he might not have that chance.

results11

the tories are catching up
labour 74, conservatives 67, lib dems 9 and others 21.

cameron is about to win his seat. so now we have to listen to his smug acceptance speech.
why has he got some of his hair ruffled? does he think he is boris? though for cameron this has to be a bad night because he can see this as being his one term as prime minister and just keeping the leadership seat warm for boris johnson.

76, 73, 9, 22
won't be long before the tories are in front.

cameron says he ran a positive campaign. that the country wants change and new leadership and cameron is ready to provide that. he is ready to do what is right for the country. he will put the national interest first (which means he will look after the rich and not the poor). he says that labour has lost the mandate to govern.

it is a tie at the moment. from now on the tories will start pulling away - but will they get enough.
is it possible that there will not be a tory majority. oh please let it be so.
i guess david cameron is now on the phone to nick clegg - please bail us out, we didn't get the results we thought we were going to get .

80, 77, 9, 22 - which goes to show what i know.

blunkett seems to be the only person who has made a stand on what the result will be.

82, 78, 9, 23
the liberals have stalled again.

85, 78, 10, 23

i am hating this. a gentle flicker of hope is beginning to grow.

results10

beginning to see more conservative gains popping up. that is not what we want to see.
looka like they have just taken basildon. tossers.

results are labour 52, conservatives 37, liberal democrats 5, others 15

basildon was symbolically important to the conservatives.

in terms of results conservatives are catching up. in terms of change labour have lost 11 seats and tories have gained 12.

57, 42, 5, 17

business wants certainty. shame the banks didn't care about such certainty. guff about sovereign debt. on the one hand they want to use greece as a fear story but also want to claim that we are not the same as greece. again it is wanting you cake and eating it - which is typical of business. talking of business how long before digby jones puts in a wobbly jowl appearance (not that i can talk about firm chiseled features).

by the way i am keeping up with things by scoffing jam doughnuts.

oh there is a picture of the workers in the bond market, they are barely moving. i bet they are going to get a wodge of a wedge for it.

60, 44, 6, 18

they really do need to jazz up the announcing of the results at each seat. the very dull reading out of the numbers is a bit dull. perhaps if they got boxing and wrestling announcers to do it there might be more exciting. so deep graveled voiced announcer shouting out that for the hundreds in the audience and the thousands at home battler brown has won his seat. then raise his hand and give him a championship belt.

the tories have gained 15 seats.

hague is chatting. he says it is clear that the tories are getting more seats and votes than any other party. hague is arguing that the tories should be allowed to form the government in the case of a hung parliament because they would have momentum.


69, 53, 8, 19

lembik opik giving a decent interview about losing, even in the face of paxman's weak gambit about the cheeky girls.

crikey cameron looks very very smug.

looks like it is going to be a fight between the moral right versus the constitutional rights.

72, 61, 8, 19


liberals are beginning to win some seats.

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currently running
labour 35, conservatives 19, liberal democrats 4 and others 12

according to the bbc online only 3 london seats have declared. two of them are for conservatives.

back to andrew neil. he just keeps talking over people.
now he has gerald scarfe - less than interesting 'cartoons' from him.

looking like cleggmania hasn't done very well for them so far. of course this now has a profound effect for brown and labour as the fewer seats that the liberal democrats have the less chance of their being a coalition.
perhaps the fear of 'personality contest' hasn't been seen through.

i am impressed with jeremy vine and his election graphics. all very matrix. though it does make him look odd.

results are coming in thick and fast. now 40, 21, 4, 12

paxman asks some lords 'do you understand what is going on' and it seems no one really does know what is going.
but another tory gain has popped up on the screen.
a liberal lord has said politics won't be the same again - paxman sighs how often have we said that before.

42, 23, 4, 13 remember they have to get 326.

getting the occasional text from jay bragging about tory wins, but he just wants it known he isn't a tory.

bugger me sideways my seat isn't going to declare until 6am. not sure i will stay awake that long. still only three seats shown in london.

now 45, 28, 4, 13
there is talk of it being a real hung party.

lembit opik has lost his seat. more time for him to spend with his pretty girls. though will they be interested now he has no power?

48, 30, 5, 14

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it seems that the results look like it means a conservative government will be an english one.

to be honest i thought it would all be done and dusted by now. still a lot of seats to be called.

blunkett saying that the results indicate that the tories will probably have enough seats so much so that there is no question of brown being able to hold on as part of coalition. now he talks of a coalition of opposition against the tories.

gordon brown holds his seat. thank fuck for that. i am sure he wants to go backstage and wipe his squeaky bum moment.
why by all that is holy is he giving great speeches now when it is too late.
or is it? have my sacrifices at the altar of onan born fruit?
come on gordon, come on labour you can do it.
(even better he didn't do 'the smile'.)
dimbleby saying that this was a valedictory speech. nick robinson seems to think that brown believes it is over and that brown has allowed enough wiggle room with his talk of 'duty' to either form a coalition government or to stand aside to allow someone else in the labour party to form a coalition party.

results at the moment are labour 28, conservatives 14, liberal democrat 4 and others 11
while this is giving me a glimmer of hope i can't help but remember this is a marathon rather than a sprint.

ed milliband says the people have spoken, but we just don't know what they have said.
we all know it will be clearer as the night goes on.

again they are banging on about who should be forming the government - ed points out the simple fact the sitting prime minister gets first shot of trying to form a government.
but that seems to be something they can't grasp or stick to - but if they stick to the simple fact they can't continue the bash brown story they are all running on.

results7

i know it is wrong to say it but lady warsi is hot stuff.

results are currently labour 8, conservative 3, liberal democtats 2 and others 7.
though the swings to conservatives is still very large. very worrying. the tory dawn seems to be on us.

they have gone back to andrew neil. he is chatting to ally campbell. he points out that the tories haven't won as well as they thought they would do. campbell says let's wait until we see what the results are. neil bangs on about how brown hasn't won an election. campbell is pointing out that the election isn't over and so that people shouldn't be making their winners statements, such as georgie boy osborne has been doing.
now neil is asking who should be the new leader of the labour party. to be honest i am not sure why brown should step down.
in fact i think him stepping down would be a mistake - if there is a serious defeat of labour then brown should be there in order to make a transition to a re-energised labour party.

brown seems to be saying that he would try to form a coalition, it is within his constitutional remit.

now it is 11, 4, 2 and 7.

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one of the things that seems to be coming out of this election is that the system needs to be reformed.
now i have to be honest i do like the first past the post system. you know where you stand. my mind has been changed a little on this by some of the smaller parties i met on the hustings. no matter what they do there is little chance that they will get elected. yet they have some interesting things to say. so hats off to hasib hikmat (united voice) and alexander van terheyden (the pirate party).
perhaps in a reformed electoral system these minor parties would get to have a say, they could always start as parliamentarians in the reformed house of lords.

oh it looks like the bond market is going to be trading as soon as they can do. seems the investors fear a hung parliament, because painful decisions will be hard to make.

conservative get their first seat and it is a gain from labour. and blow me he has gone on about change., i already hate chris skidmore (he used to work for gove, makes me hate him even more).

latest news is the tories are looking at an overall majority, that is not a good night for me or the country.
also the bbc have reported that brown will seek a coalition if there is a hung parliament.

results5

two independent seats have been won. so at the moment only 5 seats have declared.

the two stories so far are: that at the moment we are looking at a hung/balanced parliament. secondly the other main story is how people have been turned away from polling stations without being able to vote. the surprise of this is that the turnout doesn't seem to be that much larger than previous elections.
have to say the polling stations i walked by today all seemed to be working ticketyboo. yay tower hamlets.

paxman is having a chat with margaret hodge. she is smug.
now he is chatting to clegg's spokesman - asking if they are proposing to keep brown in power. though of course this is all based on the exit poll. perhaps everyone is being a bit previous.


labour hold durham north.

fuck toby young is a tory - bet his dad is shitting in the grave right now. what a cunt.

i really hate it when they go to andrew neil. i just don't like him. he is chatting to peter snow, who thinks this is the most exciting election for years. quite why they have andrew neil working and not peter snow working is beyond me.

liberal hold a seat.

results4

joan collins supports the tories. that says it all.

paxman has pointed out that a lot of the labour politicians wanted to get rid of gordon brown, so it seems odd that they want him to cling to power if there is a hung/balanced parliament.

one of the odd things of the exit polls is that the lib dems have done shit. serves smug clegg right.

the tories are quick to use the exit poll and the few results to say that the country have rejected gordon brown, but when it comes to the point that the exit poll says there is not an overall majority to the conservatives. oh the exit polls don't tell everything...
simon hughes points out the tories want it both ways.

more about people not being able to vote. bbc saying there was lots of enthusiasm to vote, but again you could be doing it from 7am until 10pm - that is 15 hours. not that hard to fit it into the day.
one thing i did learn today is i can't read a map. my polling card had my local station's location printed on it. i made my way there with some stuff for the local recycle bins only to discover the station was at the bottom of my road. me and maps!

the papers had their last minute pitches.
the sun stealing the obama hope poster - still as cameron has stolen the 'change' slogan and the rolled up sleeves look at from obama as well. i am a little shocked he hasn't been heard to say 'i'm your nigga dawg'.
the daily mail happy to imply that there will be riots and anarchy in the streets if labour win. quite why i expect them to be truthful is beyond me.

the history professor that dimbleby has on the show has argued that brown would go with dignity if there was a hung parliament because he would be concerned with his legacy. history apparently is not kind to those who cling on.
though of course it all depends on what the lib dems do in the hung/balanced parliament situation.

the polling station cock-ups seems to be the main story of the night.
there is a rambo polling station. i bet it is rock hard.

results3

dimbleby just been a turd and adked george osborn an economics question. he looked lost.

labour hold sunderland central. go go gordon. but a 5% swing to the tories. still a bit of a worry.
3 seats to the tories.

by the way i am blogging to you naked. just thought i would add that little bit of colour to the events.

osborn is going on about how labour has been rejected by the people, even though at the moment the three seats that have declared have been labour wins. i can see why they have kept him away from the media. nasty man.

why am i never polled on these sort of things?

as i wandered around the east end tonight i walked by several polling stations - none quite as busy as the ones who have had their problems. they were all busy but people getting in and getting out very amoothly.
saw some of the faces i saw on the hustings. oddly didn't get to see the prospective respect candidate (didn't get to see him at all) nor was ms ali around, though did get to see her at one of the hustings events.


i know it is wrong but the farage air crash is making me giggle.

results2

washington and sunderland west close to declaring. lots of talk about it taking longer than expected because there has been higher than expected turnout for the election.
harriet harman is on the radio going on about how everyone has the right to vote - of course that is true, but people know the times and the rules, so is it the fault of the system? or is it their fault.

washington call it for labour. yay. go gordon. though it does have labour down a big chunk. an 11% swing to the tories. fuckity fuck fuck, that means disaster.
bloody increase in turnout seems to be helping the tories. wankers all.
at the moment 2 seats to labour, both were safe ones, but both have swings to conservatives.

crikey isn't eric pickles very very round.

paxman is going on about the possibility of challenges. (which also lets you know i am watching bbc)

mandelson has pointed out that tories vote early (for those that care jay voted at 7am) while labour voters vote later in the day.

results1

just back in from a movie.
first thing i see is the exit poll, and it is showing a convincing win for the conservatives.
just what i didn't want to see.
to be honest we all know that the tories will win, but i have everything i can cross crossed in order to put off the victory.

crikey they are talking of the results being legally challenged because of not everyone being able to vote. though as someone has said the polling stations had been open for 15 hours.

vote

vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote.
in case you are not sure then vote anyone but not the conservatives.

let me just repeat that:

vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote vote.
in case you are not sure then vote anyone but not the conservatives.

or to put it more simply: vote labour.


this has been a public pat service broadcast.
you know i make sense.

quote

elections make for strange bedfellows.

there i was reading the daily mirror - the front page all about some girl from 'coronation street' battling cancer. a tiny box telling us that alan johnson (secretary of state for the home department) believes labour can win. true the whole piece was very short. it isn't like i would expect the mirror to big up the labour party or anything, after all corrie is so much more important than a national election.

also included in the paper was an 'exclusive' with ross kemp. ross had this to say: "after seeing the debates, i think it would be easy to confuse the election with a personality contest. ultimately this election is about who is the person to look after you and your family for the next five years not who would like to go for a pint with." (ross kemp, daily mirror, may 3rd).

now i am not the wisest person in the world, but given the circumstances that looks to me to be something you put on your front page, especially as kemp is going on to endorse gordon brown and labour.
oh hold on, someone from corrie might be dying. yup that is the story to go with.

to make matters worse (well for me) a similar view has been expressed by rod liddle. he had described the fact that the three tv debates had made such an impact as 'frankly worrying'. i couldn't help but agree with rod, not something i can say very often.

that the election for prime minister seems to have hinged on three tv debates and little else does point to a new style of politics. much more presidential and much more superficial. if we are going to elect just based on their ability to look at a camera and remember the names of some people in the audience then i think we have entered a dangerous era.
if it is going to come down to how they are on tv then i want more. sure they can deliver statistics to the camera, of course they can reel of policies while engaging the audience, and certainly they can all point out the weaknesses in their opponents. simple stuff.
but can they do it while spinning plates? can they do it while juggling on a unicycle? how about if they had to sing the statistics in a folk styling? or they could only denigrate the opposing policies while drinking a glass of water with a ventriloquist dummy on their laps. at least that way we will have some fun and we will know that the future prime minister is game for a laugh.

sodden

soaked on saturday. sopping shirt.
soaked on sunday. soggy socks.

inspiration

you can find inspiration all over the place.
it might be a mate doing the london marathon.
it might be a chance encounter with a homeless person who has an interesting story to tell.
it might be the surprising meeting with someone you barely know who tells you that they have taken a big leap and have decided to follow their dream.
it might be watching local people trying to make a difference as they stand for councillors.
it isn’t the finding of inspiration that is the problem, the difficult part, the real trick is to take that inspiration and do something special with it. that is the key. only then is it truly inspiring.

debate3.14

not sure anyone won the last debate. not that it matters as most of the media is ready to hang brown out to dry and claim that it is just between clegg and cameron.

now that the debates are over, i feel that we are now closer to running presidential politics. we are hearing from fewer of the other members of the potential cabinets. i think that is a big worry.
when we get the next one of these expect the wives to be involved.

i have enjoyed the debates, i am not sure it has benefitted democracy as much as others have claimed. it is an interesting adjunct to it, but we need to hear from more voices of those who would be part of the government.

crikey reeta chakrabarti is a bit of alright.

(annoying but clever from a tory mp)

geez time for bed.

debate3.13

final statements and then i can get back to rochelle on babestation.

cameron he loves the country, and we can do even better in the years ahead. right values, back the family, backs works, keeping us safe and secure. how we look after the weak and frail is a the way to judge people. well we have seen how they have done that in past. so they can fuck off.
did like the vote labour you get more of the shame, vote lib dem it is just uncertainty.

clegg do things different can build a better fairer britain. with the lib dems we can change it for good. we can do so much better. fair taxes, smaller classes size, open politcs that you can trust again. chose the future you want. it can happen.

brown politics does matter. big causes we can fight for. differences between the parties. labour has polices for the future, the tories don't. things are too important for people who haven't thought through their policies. they are not ready for government. it is up to the people to decide. shit he did his smile thing, brown is not really good on tv.

the handshake thing is still pants.

so in summing up. both clegg and cameron are about inspiring us. brown happy enough just to tell us what the deal is.

debate3.12

kids and chances.
brown all about social mobility. perhaps not a great point from him as it seems it has not been brilliant under labour.
cameron give teachers and heads as captains of their ships. raise aspiration. big society. other organisations to come on in to run schools.
clegg raise the money spent on poorest kids to that spent on pupils of fee paying schools. sounds interesting. one to one tuition, smaller class sizes.

(i am flagging now - could be that i really don't care about kids)

perhaps the simple answer is that money into the educational system should be in at the start and not to the university end.

cameron - going back to basics. the 3rs, setting/ streaming. i almost agree with him.
again the simple answer is smaller class sizes. has been the answer for years, and i suspect it will be the answer in years to come. clegg comes closest to this.

clegg really works the camera.

debate3.11

benefits. i have paid taxes all my life and have retired, what are you going to do to encourage people not to live off benefits all their lives. or the-i-hate-the-scroungers-that-i-read-about-in-the-daily-mail question.
(and just to let you know i am rochelle has poured baby oil on herself but i am still concentrating on this, give me a medal.)

clegg lift income tax threshold is a good incentives. he says too many people make the sensible decision that when they do the sums that work is not always profitable.
brown says no life on the dole. forced to work. more about young people who are unemployed. compulsion to work. get those on incapacity off benefit and into work. work is about self-esteem.
cameron if you can work we will do all we can for you, but if you are offered a job but you don't take it you can't have benefits.

if ever there were signs that these people are not in touch with what is going on out there.
employment may be the way to self-esteem but minimum wage is not great.
they may as well start talking about the workhouse.
there may be a lot of benefit fraud going on out there, but there are a lot of employers who are happy to take the piss out of people.
of course none of them are going to campaign to see wages raised to a sensible and decent level.

now i have to say as a middle-aged (oh ok old) unemployed bloke i am bored with hearing about the effort of getting the youth back to work, think about the oldsters out there.

they all agree that benefits should be conditional. oddly i agree with them, but it isn't just about penalising those on benefits and look to what the employer should be doing. (yeah like that is going to happen).

debate3.10

housing. how can we afford a new house.

cameron people who work hard don't get good things, but those who don't save and work hard do get rewards. cut spending (yeah that helps). build more houses. shame you are part of a party who flogged off a huge amount of social housing.

clegg says open up the boarded up empty properties. great idea. local councils should be able to borrow to build more homes.
brown more building. more shared equity. more lending.

cameron says more part rent/part owned. reward responsibility these people can get equity from the council or housing association when they move up.

oh for fuck sake build more social housing, that is the sodding answer. it is not rocket science. at least clegg is advocating it.

debate3.9

oh look they have a black guy to ask a question about immigration. nice touch. his question is about being in touch with people.

brown says he wants to create jobs. wants to see more people in britain getting jobs in britain. cutting the number of people who can come into the country. he has pointed out the most basic point that if the people in the country were trained for work available there would be no need for immigrant labour - well accept for wage undercutting, but no one would do that would they?

cameron says immigration is too high and for too long. proper controls. transitional controls for new european companies. only wants 10s of thousands, he says it would be a better way of integrating people.

clegg we are there to serve the people and to act on their concerns (not that they will bring in the death penalty, but that is another story). clegg wants a regional approach, he wants a boarder force, he wants to deal with the criminal gangs who deal with illegal immigration.

brown knows people who are worried about to getting jobs. protecting jobs. training people up. talking about counting people in and out of the country. one wonders why they ever stopped doing this.
cameron has a pop at clegg for their 'amnesty', says it would make a bad situation worse. clegg points out that only boris is offering a blanket amnesty, he goes on to say it is a problem that does have to be dealt with and can't be ignored. clegg throws out 80% immigration from eu (which means that the government can't do anything about it) (shame that it turns out that the 80% is a made up figure - turns out it is around 40%, clegg hasn't been very good with his figures - he got it wrong when it was the number of pages in educational documents).
clegg does have something important to say about the 'good' illegals. as he says it is dealing with the world as it is.
clegg gets a nice dig in at cameron 'assume when you talk about our policy it is wrong', very nice but ruined by the 80% figure he uses.
brown says they are both wrong. but he would say that wouldn't.

cameron wants just 10s of thousands of immigrants.

debate3.8

manufacuring.
clegg agrees we can't just have offices and shops. banks lending to manufacturing. invest in what we need for the future - housing, green industry, public transport.
brown creation of jobs in green, digital and bio-tech industries will be a big part of the future. banks lending (again. sounds like the solution is to nationalise the banks - won't hear that as a solution).
cameron investing in science base, invest in apprenticeships (sensible). make it easier to employ people. low taxes for businesses.

clegg points out that they are all pretty much in agreement on the basics.
brown points out that labour has increased apprenticeships and the number of people going to university (though we do need to cut down on the media degrees - they are only going to be sob stories on future x-factors).

cameron has a new catch phrase 'confusion between the economy and the government', have to help businesses employ people. government should buy more from small and medium businesses. though how all these new smaller contracts are going to be managed when you have cut all the back room staff isn't addressed.

(the recording that i have made from the tv is going spazzy - freeview box is toss.)

brown points out that cutting investments isn't going to help.
cameron points out that for all the hot air (see what i am doing here) from brown that we are not doing as well as we could be in renewables.
cameron goes on about how he is cutting taxes on businesses.

seems we have hit the half way point. so we get a bit about the snp and plaid cymru. do we care? no not really.

debate3.7

bankers bonuses and fairness.
cameron - it is unacceptable what has happened. bank levy. don't wait for the rest of the world do it now. banks to loan. retail banks not to engage in casino like deals.
clegg - no bonuses for bank directors. no cash bonuses over £2k. no bonuses from banks making losses.
brown - he helped banks in order to save savings and deposits. all about recapitalising the banks. needs a world wide levy.

cameron comes back and says that labour hitched the whole economy to the city. banks to be better regulated.
clegg says both labour and tories much too close to the city. he is right. split up the banks that way banks shouldn't be able to hold a gun to the head of the country.
brown is all about getting the money back from the banks.

only two mentions of obama. one from cameron and one from brown. has the magic of the big o, dwindled.

cameron on about the lib dems joining the euro. cameron is all about staying out of the euro and keep our currency. clegg says he isn't about joining the euro, which is not quite what they had in their manifesto. (paddy ashdown will later say that clegg is saying the same as the manifesto, but in a different way. dancing on the hed of a pin).

the graphic at the back of them is doing my head in.

clegg says there should be a 10% levy on banks profit.
brown says will get the money back - by selling on the shares that the country owns.
cameron talks about corporation tax for small businesses - quite how that equates to banks as small businesses is beyond me they all seem to make lots of money (even if they can only do it because we, the people, have bailed them out).

debate3.6

taxes.
brown - accepts it has been tough. giving out tax credits. bangs on about the tory tax cuts of the very rich.
cameron - taxes more because government spend more. wants to stop the one tax he can: national insurance. tax credits will stay.
clegg - does his thing of getting nice with the questioner. he says we need to change the tax system make it fairer, close loop holes, make the rich pay more and make sure that it is fairer to those at the bottom.

cameron defends the inheritance tax. it should only be paid by the richest. not a top priority.
clegg slags this off. says it is about those who are struggling to pay the bills.
perhaps the answer isn't about tax, perhaps it is about making sure that employers pay decent wages? well we know that isn't going to happen.

have to say i agree with cameron - those over £50k shouldn't be getting tax credits. just as i am feeling some love for cameron he goes on about how it is brown's fault the economy is in the toilet. nothing to do with greedy bankers who have laughed all the way to the ...ahem.. bank,
(oh that is right from cameron's point of view they are wealth creators.)

debate3.5

about to start watching the leadership debate - i am giving up the joy of watching the lovely rochelle on babestation, she is a vote winner.

cameron tells us that we need to change to get the country out of a rut. get people working, tax banks and start making things here. oh and get value for money from public services. he is not joining the euro.

clegg tells us it is about us- you and me. a fairer economy. honest about cuts. rediscover a passion for building things. fair taxes. fairness and prosperity.

brown a quick reference to his faux pas, then a bit about his record, and he says he will protect britain from a potential euro lead recession.

none of them like euro.

here comes the questions. first up spending cuts: be honest and tell us what they are going to be.
clegg says he has done. scrapping biometeric passports, no to the eurofighter, public pay freeze.
brown has set out a 4 year reduction plan. fair tax rises and spending cuts. not allowing front line areas to be cut. savings elsewhere. (of course the question is why have you waited until now for these cuts?)
cameron yup there are going to have to be cuts, but will protect front line staff. there will be difficult things. public sector pay freeze, people will have to retire a year later. get the economy growing.

so far no real cuts there. all about savings. clegg says it is a case of not knowing what the situation is. clegg banging on about politicians putting the country first. hear hear.
brown says there will be cuts in several departments. there will be cuts in capital investment. public sector pay and pension to be hit. brown hits cameron's cuts. support the economy.
cameron says his savings is all about 1 in £100. risk to the recovery isn't waste but the national insurance rise.
brown reiterates that don't cut until the recovery is sorted.
cameron says start with benefits - mmm can you say workhouse. where are the jobs? oh yeah you mean get people working at minimum wages while you cut taxes for the rich. tosser.
clegg. fairness. nice to talk about, we all want it. but how. tell me.

brown winning this one.

debate3.4

just heard a voter say that if she votes for nick clegg then she should get nick clegg. comparing it to her ordering desert in a restaurant. yup that is how democracy works.

the polls have cameron as the winner at the moment. no shock there.
seems the rochdale incident has made no differences.

oh farage is on. he looks as odd as gove. farage could be character from the muppets.
the greens say leave personality out of it and concentrate on the message.
the bnp said something but my tv chose that moment to go into digital spaz attack.

newsnight over so i am checking out 'family guy' not as funny as the leadership debate, once i have had a few chuckles i will get back into the debate. (it is not the best family guy episode.)

i know you want me to.

debate3.3

the journalist from the times - says cameron was good. i wonder why? any bias?
a labour bloke says brown very good on substance.
lib dem lass says brown was dead in the water.

times journalist says it is a time for change election - but is it?

oh ok i take it back - sometimes they are tossers.

they are saying that the debates were great for democracy. were they? or have they just reduced it all down to a personality contest between three talking heads?

debate3.2

they are going on about the worm.
sometimes i think that social media shouldn't be allowed to be involved in this sort of thing. citizen journalism is wank.
after all - look at the shit i am putting out.

apparently it isn't what is said - it is how it is said.
so we might as well let su-bo take control of the economy. cowell can be the chancellor.

i am sure there is science behind it all - but it seems sad that we are going to be lead by sound bites.
oh fuck me there is a word cloud generator.
on and now twitter - fuck me. only 33,000 tweeters. on well. and look they are picking out 'funny' tweets - except that they are not funny.
here we go stuff from facebook. all of them showing why that perhaps it should be about the experts and not people like me.

debate3.1

back home from the hustings.
have eaten and now listening to the analysis of the leadership debate.
just heard ashdown say that this is now a two horse race between clegg and cameron. what is he smoking?
very odd listening to the analysis without knowing what was said.
oh there is michael gove saying cameron winning- he is an odd fish.

paddy ashdown is the more interesting of the political commentators.
gove looks like a puppet. plus he is very rude.
yvette cooper says it is about jobs. she is a bit foxy. though that is me going off message.

gove going on about immigration. he says that there should be a limit on the number of people who can come into the country. though he still says that tens of thousands of people can come in.
ashdown - there is a hidden problem with illegal immigration (gove loves interrupting - mind you it worked because ashdown didn't get to finish his point). oh he is going on about it. he says the lib dems do have a policy: amnesty.

debate3.0

for some inexplicable reason my local council is having a meet the councillors evening at the same time that the leadership debate is on.
smart planning.
so i am off to hear what the locals have to say.
i will record the debate and comment on it later.
i know you were all looking forward to reading me at the same time as hearing brown, cameron and clegg pontificate, but sadly not tonight.
(what do you mean you don’t read it....?)

enjoy

this st george's day.
lovely weather out there - going to take some photos of pretty people in silly clothes. i really don't understand fashion.

debate2.15

polls - mmm two polls have put brown last. i wonder if the fact that both of them are for murdoch papers has nothing to do with those results.
sky doing there bit to kick brown. so much for unbiased coverage. more proof that the bbc is essential.

bring on the third debate.

debate2.14

some of the analysis is painful
bob ainsworth less than secure with his defence of gordon brown.
the bickering between ainsworth, michael gove and chris huhne - the most entertaining of the night. i think if they had the chance they would slap each other.
schoolyard bullies. funny to a point but very pathetic in the end.

earlier there was a moment of incredulity as the bnp spokesperson said that britain could be an islamic republic. the poor lass from the bbc had trouble not dropping her jaw down to the floor.

now sky are doing presentational stuff. perhaps that is the downfall of these debates, as we move further down the american route.

debate2.13

the handshaking at the end was pretty wanky.
now it is the analysis and trying to work out who has won the debate.

oh the bbc have lead this analysis with scotish national party. like we care what they say.

debate2.12

summing up. brown says the buck stops with him. maybe that should be the euro? or the pound. brown is in the position of being able to say that he has done some big choices.
he claims cameron is a risk to the economy. clegg a risk to security.

cameron says brown is sounding desperate. vote tory get something new. oh family values, pretty sure that is old tory. build big society. shame he didn't offer a free pony to everyone.

clegg shape the world. all about acting differently. something exciting happening. coming closest to doing an obama. his summing up more about hope and the future than slagging off the other two.

clegg wins the summing up.

debate2.11

immigration.
clegg - border controls. direct people to areas of the country. amnesty on illegals.
brown - not for an amnesty. labour control and manage via point system, looking to reduce the number of skills we need to get from abroad. can't argue with that.
cameron - we have benefitted from immigration (and strong society). too much recently, need to cap it.

cameron having a pop at clegg over regional immigration. real change says cammeron. still not sure what he is going to do.
clegg asks them not to ignore the issue as it is - that there are illegal who are working for criminals and not for the taxman.

each of them have been able to point to the other two squabbling.

cameron seems to think that it has only been a problem under labour, rose tinted glasses in play there. was an issue under the tories as well.

clegg seems to want to deal with an clear and present issue - while david and gordon seem to skirt that.

debate2.10

should we have a coalition government?
cameron says in some cases yes. doesn't want a hung parliament. not quite the answer the question demanded. cameron is saying no.
clegg thinks there should be some working together on some things. potential for working together - but no coalition.
brown says we also have some of this - but not with the shadow ministers.

so they all skirt the question. all say it would be nice and friendly, but in the end they want to be in power.

they have had to be reminded about the question.

cameron is back on the job tax.

clegg comes closest to answering the question - but he has the most to win in a coalition situation.

brown pays lip service to working together.
in the end it seems cameron and brown can't even think about working together - it brings them both out in hives.

cameron said 'day one' tosser. that phrase should be banned. it doesn't make you hip and trendy.

brown says the priority is making the economy stronger and secure.

not sure any of them really care about the question - they are just bickering and cameron gets a laugh from pointing that out.

debate2.9

state pension.
brown pension to be linked to average earnings. women to get full state pension. dignity in retirement.
cameron says dignity and security in old age - so the state does have something to. men to retire a year later.
clegg points out the other costs that pensioners have to meet. fuel costs - well that is what happens when those companies can earn shit loads without social responsibility, perhaps cameron's big society would do well to start there.

crikey brown has thrown down a gauntlet.
cameron claims it is all scare tactics, and that labour is lying.

clegg about people before politics.

cameron and brown ready to go to handbags. have to give it to cameron, as much as it pains me.

debate2.8

on to the question of does your vote count.
pretty simple answer - yes.

cameron on about expenses. i don't think it is that big a deal. oh he is going on about cutting the size of parliament again. though that goes against his idea of bringing people into politics - reduce the number of people who represent us, it makes it harder for voices to be heard.

clegg - old party politics. again. too late to register now.

brown ashamed of some of the mps. can't help but think that no matter what any of the leaders say about this is all crocodile tears.

cameron says politicians have treated the public as mugs. he goes on about responsibilities as well. we have to change the country. in which case why do we need them? as brown says you can't run the health service as a diy project.

clegg says politics shouldn't be a job for life. he might be right there.

cameron says fairness. brown points out cameron's fairness is for the richest.

clegg really is working that 'old politics'.

debate2.7

correction - murdoch and co are not petty. they are allowing the debate to be shown on bbc news 24.
i take it back. i was wrong. don't sue me.

(thanks to my pal paul for pointing it out to me.)

now watching it on the bbc rather than sky. call me a rebel.

debate2.6

pope in britain. should he be allowed in?
cameron says yes - but not fully in agreement with the catholic church. says faith is good.
clegg - he is not a man of faith, his wife is catholic. welcomes the visit, but hopes there is greater recognition of errors of the church.
brown - has met some of those who were victims. so the church has to deal with the problems. but he welcomes the pope's visit.

so agreement there.

cameron on about tolerance, and as he points out they all seem to agree.

peace on earth has broken out.